I'm a Ph.D. student and instructor at Colorado State University. I write about users and the frustrations and joys of our digital lives. In addition to Forbes, I have written for The New Yorker, New York, Salon, National Catholic Reporter, Native American Times, and The Kansas City Star.

Ray William Johnson: =3 Adds Up To Most-Subscribed On YouTube

UPDATE (11/19/2011): This week Ray William Johnson’s channel became the first to reach 5 million subscribers.

This is the fifth installment of a 6-part weekly series about some of the most successful video entrepreneurs on YouTube. Each segment will spotlight performers and personalities that go beyond the one-hit viral video and build a loyal audience. Their online presence reaches multi-millions and has gained them entry into the YouTube Partner Program , which splits revenue and helps the BoomTubers develop their growing business.

BoomTuber #5: Ray William Johnson

Last week, Ray William Johnson’s =3 channel became the most subscribed-to on YouTube. What draws 3.9 million members to join is a fairly simple formula – every Monday and Thursday, Johnson adds his frenetic commentary, with multiples of screwiness and brilliance, to the best videos he can find online. The channel recently eclipsed 1 billion upload views. [See a sample video below.]

Factor in Your Favorite Martian — a channel of hilarious animated music videos that has 1.1 million subscribers — and Breaking Los Angeles — a Friday night vlog with over 700,000 subscribers — and YouTube has few, if any, more powerful components than Johnson.

In a recent email conversation, the 23-year-old, now living in Los Angeles, demonstrated just how insightful he is about what drives the YouTube phenomenon, just how little use he has for the old guard of entertainment and just how well he can argue his points. Maybe that’s because he once planned on being a lawyer …

In fall 2007, I stood at the midway point of completing my undergraduate studies at Columbia. I studied every moment that I wasn’t sitting in class. I was very focused on maintaining a solid GPA, so I could go on to law school. During my long study sessions in the library, I found myself watching YouTube videos during study breaks. I couldn’t afford to buy a television for my dorm, so these very brief yet very accessible videos quickly became my main source of entertainment.

It didn’t take me long to notice that a handful of people were creating video blogs and consistently posting them online. For some inexplicable reason, I found these very appealing. In fact, I found them so appealing I eventually decided to make my own using an old MiniDV camcorder that someone lent me. For almost a year, I sporadically made these rather lame video blogs in my dorm. These video blogs were reflective of most video blogs during that time in that they had no real structure and were kind of just all over the place. In these, I just sat there and stared into the camera and talked about my life and what I had learned about in class to an audience of roughly thirty people. While thirty people might sound like an insignificant number, it meant the world to me and still does.

For a while, I uploaded these video blogs to my first YouTube channel which has since been closed. During all this, I noticed that YouTube was full of video blogs but really lacked any sort of formatted show. At the same time, I began to consider why people came to YouTube and arrived at the conclusion that people visit the site for one of two reasons: They’re either there to watch viral videos, or they’re there to watch their favorite video blogger. Using that analysis, I conceived my first formatted show, “Equals Three.” The idea behind “Equals Three” was to combine video blogging and viral videos and place them within a rigid format, so that only the actual blogging and viral videos would change each episode. For this particular show idea, I started the channel known today as the RayWilliamJohnson channel, uploaded the episodes twice weekly, and two years later Forbes is contacting me for an interview. So much for law school.

Since then, I’ve been fortunate enough to produce and/or co-produce a number of shows, all of which have been, luckily, well received.

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My older children are long time fans of =3. My husband and I are fairly new YouTube viewers. We started watching =3 after becoming addicted to Breaking Los Angeles. It’s a fun, slick, often boozy fast paced commentary on living in LA seen through the eyes of 20 something single guys. The camera loves Ray, sexy Big Rob and the various stereotypical hot LA girls they bring along on their adventures each week. Ray knows exactly which buttons to push on =3 to get teens and young adults interested and coming back. There are plenty of quasi-crude references and jokes. Yet, if you watch Breaking LA long enough, you find this super intelligent, overindulgent guy you would never expect to find if you were a fan coming from =3. There seems to be a loyalty to his fans you rarely see from a “Hollywood star”. Clearly, he has the same loyalty to the medium that made him famous. We wish him and =3 continued success in his new position as the number one most subscribed channel on YouTube.

margiemama — You touched on the key to this whole series when you mentioned loyalty. There wouldn’t be a following without the pure entertainment, of course, but that loyalty factor could eventually change the landscape of the industry.

Equals Three is a hilarious show and I think that Ray is very deserving of the title of #1 most suscribed youtuber. Not only is Ray entertaining but as you can see he is actually very smart. Ray’s simple format and witty comments is what makes the show a success. To conclude, I think that Ray is a great guy and I wish him the best of luck for the future (:

Here in Greece, I’ve been watching =3 for about half a year and while when I started only one of my friends and my brother was watching it, now there are about 5 of my friends! It is a great show…keep up with the good work! Great interview too.

in a country like India where people believe in deep spirituality, the foul humor RWJ uses are far far cry……even in such situation teenagers like me end up on =3 page, why???……the answer’s probably he got what it takes, but if you go a little deeper, frankly saying, its more like a mutual love, you can feel that they’re (most YouTube channels) one of you and you can actually connect their works with your everyday life, by any aspects, that’s actually pulls audience closer… Wanna wish RWJ a glorious future and, ya, for GEEZUS’ sake, stop being sooo as***le….. —–With love from India

I think Ray does a great job when he chooses videos for the show. The internet is the future. There is no competition from tv when you live in Ireland. We are the last to see everything on tv.. its a complete joke

i been subscribed to =3 for the last year or so now. I never miss a show. I love it! Ray is so funny! I love someone whos not afraid to tell it like it is. His videos always make me laugh. I will always watch them. My friends love them too. Keep it up Ray!!

This sounds like something I need to be involved in… Not for my own gain, but to spread economic solutions. Now… I suppose I need to borrow my son’s video camera and try to entertain with an exciting economic plan?? Here’s a cut and paste which you can toss out if need be (But I’d rather be thrown a few tips to saving the economy rather than making a few bucks and gaining the fame).

The issue of lack of job growth and a dead economy is not with the failure of small business, nor is due to the taxing or not taxing of the uber-wealthy inasmuch as the lack of true incentives to those with investment funds.

The MEALER ECONOMIC PLAN is the solution. From this link, you can read the briefed Arizona version that the Arizona legislature, Congress and Governor is stumbling over, but the National Plan soon to be released is the real deal… With the real incentives!